His father, who had no formal training in law, successfully argued a case in the Supreme Court in the Philippines to redefine agency ownership of fixed property by permanent resident aliens. In order to pass the bar in the Philippines, Anil Jethmal proudly points out, prospective lawyers need to study his father’s work. Anil’s father, the most principled person he ever knew, drew his own pride from feeding entire starving villages across India.
Anil’s grandfather founded, grew and, for three decades, ran the largest domestic electronics company in India. He was affectionately referred to as “The Baron” for all his charitable work throughout the country.

Anil Jethmal’s younger cousin is a self-made billionaire at age 44. He has earned hundreds of millions of dollars each in two separate companies in two completely different industries. More than that, he did it in two different countries. In both cases, he started from scratch, and not only taught himself each business, but has revolutionized the way all others following him now conduct business in each arena. Along the way, he has found the time and energy to do tremendous charitable work for senior citizen housing and education for the visually impaired.

Another cousin co-founded a company that The Independent proclaimed as one of the top ten music venues in the world, ranking among the Sydney Opera House in Australia and Madison Square Garden in New York City. Along the way, he has designed and executed a music and arts program to expose children to social issues like Women’s Rights and Celebrating Special Needs Children. His programs have reached and benefitted hundreds of thousands of needy children across India.

While Anil Jethmal has worked one on one with mentally challenged children in Southern Maine through Bowdoin College’s Project BARC, and has tutored economically disadvantaged children in Harlem, New York, his goal is to give back to society on a much larger scale. That, he proudly points to his family’s achievements, is true and complete professional success.

When stockbroker Anil Jethmal was featured in the 1995 book, The Winner’s Circle II: How 10 Stockbrokers Became the Best in the Business, he saw his active accounts grow from about 150 to nearly 700. Anil Jethmal currently works as the senior vice president for a large financial services corporation specializing in investment banking, insurance, account protection, and wealth management.

According to the recently released Wells Fargo/Gallup Investor and Retirement study, optimism in the investment world is at a 16-year high that has not been seen since the heyday of the dot-com boom of 2000. One of the study’s features, an “optimism index,” rests at 126, very near 2000’s 130 mark. The optimism, according to InvestmentNews, is due to an overall positive feeling regarding current economic growth, as well as manageable unemployment and inflation rates.

Of every 10 investors who participated in the survey, six said now was a good time to invest. 78 percent of survey respondents reported that they were confident they would be able to support themselves during retirement, up nearly 10 percent from three years ago.

Despite the overall rise in optimism, many investors remained skeptical regarding taxes. Though 29 percent of the respondents expected their taxes to go down, 39 percent expected to pay a higher percentage of their income in taxes in the near future.